Hope
by rose613
Summary: All of his wisdom seemed to vanish and was replaced by disbelief, then shock, and a thousand other emotions.  He was only vaguely aware that the rest of the world existed outside of the hospital room where he learned that he was going to be a father.


Disclaimer: None of this is mine, I write because I have no life, not for money. It all belongs to J.K. Rowling

_"The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function. One should, for example, be able to see that things are hopeless and yet be determined to make them otherwise." - F. Scott Fitzgerald_

"Lily?" James asked in a tentative voice that didn't suit his weathered appearance: Fresh from a violent battle, James now sported multiple scars as well as a black eye that framed his concerned hazel eyes, which stared at the back of his wife's head, which was now turned away from him, towards the wall of room 219 in St. Mungos Hospital.

She didn't answer.

He didn't expect her to.

This was his fifth plea for some sort of conversation with his wife, who had just been injured herself, though not nearly as much damage reflected on her exterior as on her interior, as she had recently received word that her friend Dorcas had been killed by Voldemort himself. Their first encounter with Voldemort had been petrifying, and yet this – the grief over losing one of their own – was even worse.

How were they to go on without Dorcas? She had been in this war since the beginning, she had been one of the Order's first recruits. She had thrown herself into the cause, giving up her own chance at having a family for the safety of others'. She had brightened each dangerous mission with her unladylike laugh and interrupted dismal meetings with the question, "Why is it that we're plotting against the most evil person to ever live, and I'm bored out of my mind?"

She had somehow found a way to truly experience life while fighting a deadly war, yet now she was dead.

Was that what would eventually happen to him? Would they all die for this war?

Even though he knew that these sort questions would surely produce unhealthy, guilt inducing answers, James could not help but wonder whether he would be responsible for his friend's deaths, because he was responsible for them joining the Order.

James sighed, and focused back on his wife.

Her silence was the worst. Besides the tick-tick-tick of the clock, things seemed so utterly dead. He found himself wishing that he was back when they had first arrived at Saint Mungo's, the go, go, go atmosphere was much more preferable to the contemplative silence that had settled over him since things had died down.

James hated the waiting and hoping that surrounded a post-battle environment. It stressed him out, simply sitting and staring at the back of his wife's head, or the other patients for whom he could do nothing to help. He fleetingly wished that he was a healer for the war instead of a fighter. At least healers went home at the end of the day knowing that they did everything that they could to help save their patient. James would go home wondering if he could have cast that shield charm just a moment earlier, or if he could have stunned a Death Eater sooner, then maybe he could have prevented a death.

He could still faintly hear Dumbledore conversing with the Head Healer, but James had left the conversation when he had been summoned to Lily's room. He actually had no idea why she had wanted him there, for she had preferred solitude when they had first arrived, and James had obliged, knowing that sometimes Lily needed that. However, James wondered now why she had abruptly changed her mind, as all she was doing was lying there, and didn't seem to be in any particular rush to start a conversation.

Much to his surprise, she suddenly interrupted his reverie and said, in a soft and strangled voice, "I'm fine."

Having received top marks in all of his N.E.W.T's, as well as having been Lily's husband for six months, James Potter was not one to be fooled with as pathetic a statement as that.

"Lil-" he began, but he stopped talking when she sat up and faced him. Her face was stained with tears that she had not bothered to wipe away. Mascara that was applied before they had been called into battle now surrounded her swollen, bloodshot eyes.

"The Healer told me that I'm fine. Er- yes, she said that I'm perfectly fine." Her voice was shaky and tears seemed to be imminent, so James took a chance and moved his chair closer to her bed.

She spoke again almost immediately, and rushed through her sentences: "I was just hit with a rather, erm, strong Stupify curse. I knew I wasn't hurt. It was just a stunning curse, I shouldn't have even brought here. I was just off my game a little bit. I've been a bit tired lately and I thought I was coming down with something, but the Healer- the Healer said I'm pregnant."

Lily stopped talking and closed her eyes, as if waiting for an explosion, yet it took James a full moment to comprehend exactly what she just said.

"I'm sorry, what?" he asked, completely puzzled. Surely he had misheard her: She couldn't have said what he thought that she had said…

She continued, "The healer, she said I'm pregnant, I -"

But James didn't need her to finish her sentence, "You told the Healer that she was wrong, then? I mean, you're not, you can't be pregnant…you're…well, small?" He finished with a question. Weren't pregnant women supposed to be large? Even so, size was not the only reason that Lily could not possibly be pregnant. They were nineteen years old, for one: Although they had gotten married young, they had agreed that having children was out of the question. They wanted them eventually, but it was a dangerous world, and being in the Order of the Phoenix didn't help matters. Being responsible for themselves was hard enough, but adding a child to the mix could only spell disaster. No, no, she simply couldn't be pregnant. Even thinking of it was simply absurd. "You can't be pregnant…" he muttered to himself.

"Well seeing as I'm a girl and you're a boy and we shag quite a bit, yes, I actually can be." If he had not just been informed of a pregnancy that he was not nearly prepared for, mentally or otherwise, James might have smiled at his wife then, for hearing her feeble joke was certainly a good thing, considering the circumstances. As it was though, James didn't smile, for his face was otherwise preoccupied in an expression of nothing less than pure disbelief. "And I am," Lily finally confirmed.

Lily was pregnant.

As he comprehended those words, all of his wisdom seemed to vanish, and was replaced by disbelief, then shock, and guilt, anger, confusion, and a thousand other emotions. He was only vaguely aware that the rest of the world still existed outside of the hospital room, the hospital room where he learned that he was going to be a father.

James reached his hand toward her bed. Even if his brain was seemingly a hundred steps behind, at least his motor skills were working; he thought that must be something.

Apparently hers were too, as her hand willingly grasped his, and squeezed it gently.

"Sorry," Lily said, almost too softly to be heard.

"It's-it's okay. It'll be okay," James said, just as hesitant.

"No it's not, James. I'm scared, you're scared, so please, please, don't bullshit me. Please." The chill in her voice frightened him, for he could stand Lily shouting; he would just shout alongside her, but that chill was something that truly unnerved him, for one of the things that he loved about Lily was her spark, her fiery attitude. And when that was gone he never knew what to do.

There was something else in her voice though, that made it clear that she wasn't mad at him. She was what she said that she was, what she said that they both were: Scared. Bloody horrified was more like it.

"…okay. Okay. I won't." Not entirely sure of what she wanted him to say, he took a breath and continued, "You're right."

"I know…I always am…"

He returned her smile, met her eyes, and asked, "So, oh wise one, what – uh – what do you think we should do?"

"I don't know, Jamie. I really, really, really don't know. I mean, we didn't plan on this! We said, we said that we wouldn't get pregnant until the war was over. And, God, the war. James, I want kids, you know that I want kids," she paused and he nodded fiercely: He wanted kids too. "I want to have kids with you, and, if it wasn't for this bloody war, we'd be okay with this. But James, there _is_ a war going on, a war that's killing off all of our friends, and-" he marveled in the fact that Dorcas's death seemed eons away right now, "And if, if it kills us…James," she gave him a pleading look, begging him to understand.

He did.

After a short silence he suddenly said, "Jack Thomas left his family."

"Huh?"

"You know, that muggle girl he married. She's pregnant too, apparently, that's why he left."

"What?" Lily exclaimed, "That's bloody awful! Jack was always so nice, why would he do something like – "

"He had to," James cut in quickly. "Scared. The Death Eaters want him on their side. Smart of them, he's a great wizard. If they found out that he married her, that woman, and their baby, their whole family is as good as dead."

"James, not that this isn't very interesting, but…what's your point? How does this relate – "

"We could leave."

"James - !"

"No, Lil, please, hear me out. You can't fight anymore – don't deny it, you can't and you won't. You won't want me to fight, and I won't want to leave you alone. Don't you see? We're no use to the Order, not with a baby. Hell, a baby isn't gonna help us defeat Voldemort!" He was quite hysterical right now. Never, in all of their plans for the future did he imagine that he'd be here, in a depressing hospital room, trying to convince his wife to ditch the war and hide away with him and their baby.

"The war won't end anytime soon. And everyday that we fight, it puts us more and more at risk! And what do we accomplish? Maybe, maybe we put one Death Eater in Azkaban. So what? Voldemort's just gonna recruit another fucking sixteen year old Slytherin tomorrow. And every battle one of us is put in Mungo's for some reason or another, and _every battle_ the chances just increase that one of us isn't going to walk out of it alive.

"I hate this. Saying all of this, believe, I'm nauseous just thinking these thoughts, but you're thinking them too! Dumbledore is thinking them, Sirius and Remus and Peter and all of them are thinking the same things that we are! But, Lily now…we're just not invincible anymore. Maybe we never were."

Tears had long ago started coming out of Lily's eyes. Only then did he wipe them off with a gentle hand. She held it there for a moment, before subconsciously looking down at her stomach.

Done with his hysteria, and ashamed now with his outburst, he sat down beside her on the hospital bed, curling an arm around her shoulder, and accepting her head on his. He stroked her hair without really thinking, and they stayed like that for a few minutes, pondering exactly how true his words had been.

Through the overpowering urge to scream and cry that this simply wasn't fair, he knew somehow that the health of this baby, their baby, was of paramount importance. That even if he couldn't fight for the good of the Wizarding World anymore, he could fight for his family. It would be a different kind of fight, one that would undoubtedly require strength of mind and character that he had not had before. Just like the former fight, Sirius and Remus and Peter would join him, and he would be grateful for that. Still, though, even with their help, and Lily by his side it would be the hardest thing he'd ever done.

But it would be worth it.

Days later James and Lily met with Dumbledore, explained their situation, and left knowing that they could still help the Order behind the scenes, and would still be just as important there as they were in the battlefield.

Months later, Dumbledore called Lily and James, along with Alice and Frank Longbottom to Hogwarts for a conference that would drastically alter their lives, as well as the one they were so scared of that day in room 219 in Saint Mungo's.

And almost two years later, when his worst fears became a reality, and Voldemort was standing in his hallway, mere meters away from his wife and son, James Potter didn't think twice when he said words that only came naturally, and ran towards the soulless bastard whom he'd already from escaped three times.

Though he wouldn't escape. Not that time.

_A/N So I'm pretty proud of this, I've been toying with this for a while now, and I'm happy with how it turned out. It's my first story like this, so feedback is very much appreciated! _


End file.
